Nonduality, often explored in traditions like Advaita Vedānta, Mahāyāna Buddhism, and Taoism, challenges our common view of reality by separating objects, subjects, and concepts. It proposes that everything is intrinsically unified, with no real distinction between “self” and “others” or between “spirit” and “matter”. This refutes the idea of a separation between the “me” and the Universe.
In Advaita Vedānta, for example, it is taught that everything is “Brahman”, the absolute One, and that all differentiation (between self and other, between subject and object) is an illusion (māyā). arising from ignorance. It is not just a simple philosophy, but a path of direct experience of this unity. According to contemporary masters like Tony Parsons, awakening to this non-duality does not involve effort, but the direct recognition that “what is” is already complete and unified, and that the idea of separation is a mental construct.
Thus, the process of “realizing” non-duality often begins with deep questioning, a discretion between the real and the non-real, and a dissolution of personal identifications. Once the illusion of “me” is perceived as a mental construct, a feeling of oneness with the world emerges.